


A Phone Booth I Somehow Stumbled Into

by fuzzballsheltiepants



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-07
Updated: 2018-04-07
Packaged: 2019-04-19 16:03:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,283
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14240868
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fuzzballsheltiepants/pseuds/fuzzballsheltiepants
Summary: I can’t take the silence.Those five words, written in Neil’s jagged scrawl.But silence was all he had left.





	A Phone Booth I Somehow Stumbled Into

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the incredible song Superhero by Ani Difranco. Seriously, if you've never listened to it, do it. Title from the same piece.

It started with the silence.  With the gaping chasm that opened at his feet when Neil whispered those three words in his ear that Andrew could never reciprocate.  
  
It started when the unvoiced no began to outnumber the blissed out yes, yes, yes.  
  
It started when the bed lightened and quiet feet padded out, when Andrew could hear the gasping and retching from the bathroom, when he knew that Neil needed a calloused hand on the back of his neck and a voice telling him to breathe but he rolled over and closed his eyes instead.  
  
It started when Andrew’s eyes no longer sought out a flash of auburn and crystal blue in a crowd, but instead drifted to brown and blond and black.  When he began to imagine unmarred skin under his hands and the taste of a different mouth against his.  
  
It ended with a key.  
  
He came home from an endless drive through the mountains surrounding their city to find a different note to the quiet in the house they had bought a few months ago.  The key sat on the table in the entryway on a folded slip of paper.  _How cliche_ , he thought calmly, as if there wasn’t the white-hot edge of an invisible knife searing through his chest.  He picked up the paper, the sound of brass against wood echoing far too loudly.  
  
 _I can’t take the silence_.    
  
Those five words, written in Neil’s jagged scrawl.  
  
But silence was all he had left.  
  
*****  
  
It was two a.m. and Andrew didn’t know when he had last slept.    
  
A part of him had always thought his best shot at — well, not happiness, that was impossible, but contentment — was as a hermit.  He had never needed anyone.  They all betrayed him at some point.  Kevin, with his false promise that exy would be enough.  Nicky, gone back to Germany.  Aaron, content with the cheerleader and more letters after his name.  Bee and Wymack and Abby, moving on to other projects, other problems.  
  
Neil, with an abandoned key and five words on a piece of paper torn from a notebook.  
  
He didn’t really know how he had ended up here, he realized as he glanced around at the packages of cold medicine.  The fluorescent lights gave everything a slightly unreal quality, especially at this hour.  He was alone except for the bored-looking cashier who was snapping her gum so loudly he could hear it from across the drugstore.  
  
Turning into the next aisle, he found himself surrounded by row after row of greeting cards, with candy and stuffed animals lining the shelves above his head.  His eyes were drawn to the fuzzy red and white of a floppy stuffed fox, and he started to reach for it before he stopped himself, extending his middle finger at it instead.  
  
He wandered past the birthday cards and the anniversary cards, the rows for weddings and baby showers and sympathy.  There was a whole section of apology cards, and he found himself reaching for one with a mournful Labrador on the cover.  _Something went wrong_ , it said on the front.  He flipped it open.  _I’m pretty sure it was me.  I’m sorry_.    
  
Fuck Hallmark.  He stuffed the card back roughly, bought two king-sized Reese’s and a pack of the cigarettes he had given up a year ago, and left.  
  
Sitting in his car, the sweetness and salt of the peanut butter and chocolate coating his mouth and somehow tasting like ash, he pulled out his phone.  His thumb hovered over Neil’s name in his texts, as it had every day for two weeks.  _Will you meet me for coffee?_   He deleted the words and dropped the phone back onto the passenger seat.  
  
*****  
  
He found himself back at the drug store the next night, holding a card with a sad-eyed cartoon cat.  _I’m sorry_ , it said.  _Forgive me_.  
  
The next night, a hideous cartoon panda.  
  
And the night after that.  A dog wearing glasses that looked exactly like the ones sitting on his nightstand.  All with the same message.  
  
He wondered what the fuck was wrong with him.  He didn’t believe in regret, there was no point to it.  What was done was done.  _Keep moving forward_ , he told himself.  _What’s the point?_ Something whispered back.  His thumb found the narrow ridges of tissue under his armband and he jerked his hand away.  
  
The cigarettes were still sitting in their unopened box on the passenger seat next to his phone.  He reached for them but ended up with the phone in his hand instead.  His phone could track Neil’s, they had set it up that way when they bought them with some sort of joke about needing to be able to find Neil’s body when he pissed off another mobster.  He had never used the feature, never had to.   
  
GoogleMaps opened with a blinking dot.  Five minutes by car.    
  
The house was small, modest; the yard bare.  Neil’s boring car was in the carpark and Andrew pulled in behind it.  He was halfway across the lawn before he realized it was three in the morning and he was going to scare the shit out of Neil.  Hell, he’d be lucky if he didn’t get shot.  He tried to turn back towards his car but all the cracks in his armor gave way at once and he stumbled, falling to his knees.    
  
When had this happened?  He had been feared, once.  Seen as dangerous.  Crazy.  A force to be reckoned with.  The only one who could save himself.  And here he was, crumpled and broken in front of a darkened house, screaming without making a sound.  Unable to find that steel exoskeleton that had once kept the world from getting in.  
  
A light flicked on, and a voice — that voice — called his name.  Then Neil was there, in front of him, close enough to touch but he didn’t dare raise his hand to do it.  “Andrew, what’s wrong?”  There was an urgency there and he dragged his gaze up to meet Neil’s eyes, which shone with fear and anguish and something else, something that stemmed from those three words Andrew wasn’t strong enough to say.  
  
He opened his mouth but nothing came out.  “When did you last sleep, Drew?” Neil asked, the sharpness in his tone softening as he took in Andrew’s face.  
  
“Not sure,” Andrew managed to say.  “I think it’s been a while.”  
  
“Come inside.”  Neil held out his hand, and inch away from Andrew’s.  Andrew studied it for a moment then grabbed it.  It was warm, and strong, and with it he found his feet.  
  
Suddenly he was in a small, bare kitchen and Neil was making tea.  Cinnamon apple.  He added a large spoonful of honey and pushed it across the counter.  Andrew’s hands reflexively closed around it and he thought he drank it.    
  
The next minute he was in an unfamiliar bedroom, wearing Neil’s sweatpants and t-shirt and sliding under warm covers to put his back to the wall.  Neil slipped in after him and lay facing him, not touching him, just watching him with an almost religious awe.    
  
Andrew felt himself sinking beneath the warmth and the comfort and the safety.  “I didn’t know how to say it,” he whispered.  
  
“Say what?” Neil asked, and there was a hint of fear and pain and Andrew wanted to hurt whoever had caused it.  
  
“I didn’t know how to say that I’m in love with you.”  
  
Neil’s eyes closed and a shudder wracked his frame.  “Like that, Drew,” he said, voice thick and cracking.  “You say it just like that.”  
  
“I love you.”  
  
“I love you too.”  
  
And with that, peace. 

**Author's Note:**

> I have been flipping between four other fanfics but I woke up at 4:30 this morning with this basically written and just needing to be translated onto the page. The song that inspired this is one of my all-time favorites. As always, comments and feedback are always appreciated. HMU at my Tumblr @fuzzballsheltiepants if you prefer.


End file.
